In an increasingly security-conscious world, protecting access to information and/or to systems from unwanted discovery and/or corruption is a major issue for both consumers and businesses. The growth of system connectivity has been one of the major developments in recent years. Fewer and fewer systems are operating as stand-alone devices, and most of today's systems are increasingly becoming elements of complex networks. These systems may comprise processing units, which may be required to perform general processing functions including, but is not limited to, loading code and/or data, performing code validation, executing code instructions, and performing memory manipulations. The growth in networking allows improved performance and increased flexibility.
Because of this growth in system distribution and connectivity, system security, and protection against unwanted access and/or corruption, has become a major concern for systems owners and/or operators since systems in general, and processing units in particular, may be exposed to potential external security threats and breaches attempting to gain access to the systems and/or information and data stored within the systems. To that end, many systems may comprise dedicated security subsystems, which may be utilized to monitor the system security throughout its operations.
In addition to security concerns, power conservation has also become a critical requirement and/or consideration in systems. Use of power savings techniques that enable conserving power has become a focus issue in designing systems and/or their components.
Further limitations and disadvantages of conventional and traditional approaches will become apparent to one of skill in the art, through comparison of such systems with some aspects of the present invention as set forth in the remainder of the present application with reference to the drawings.